Six years beyond the onset of global crisis and the lamentation seems louder: pundits are increasingly perplexed by the planet's prolonged period of perpetual perturbations. So, does anything stand out in 2014 as an "out of the blue" development?

While it might sound bizarre to say so, the crises, both in Iraq and Ukraine, are playing to the strengths of Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Within all of the uncertainty, Canadians have been largely satisfied with Prime Minister Harper's response.

The Department of National Defence is currently being hounded by Treasury Board, which had designed a system that makes it impossible for DND to manage its budget. As a result, the military keeps falling behind in equipment purchases and capacity keeps declining. The government could put an end to this stalemate if it wished to, but instead seems delighted that it is pocketing the unspent money to meet its deficit-fighting promises. Canadians already have a small military and it just keeps shrinking.

In a few weeks time Ukrainian voters will be going to the polls to elect a new president to replace Viktor Yanukovych, who fled the country for the safety of Russia amid a Tahrir Square-style, people power uprising. The Cabinet of Ministers has no lack of urgent agenda items to deal with. Several pitfalls lie ahead: